A New Generation of Joking
by Bionic Blowfish
Summary: Haley must leave her home when the man she calls father is killed by the one who owns her life. Will she be able to find her true father, but also herself, while the new generation of Gotham's heroes and villains are also finding their calling?


It's no secret that The Penguin is more then a little of a pervert. But what _is_ a secret is that his pet is his daughter.

Born to a pair of thieves, my existence runs a high risk of trouble if it were ever revealed to the wrong people. And, according to my father, the 'wrong people' are _all_ people, especially after an incident two years ago. Alcohol can be deadly when consumed by a feeble mind full of secrets. And Bryce, the caring boyfriend he was that night, took advantage of my weakened state to ask about my father.

Apparently Oswald Cobblepot held significance in his mind. I had no clue as to why, Bryce was from a few states over. My father was only active with mobs here in Metropolis. There was no reason for him to know the name Cobblepot. No reason for him to mark me as he did. And yet, through out the years that have passed since that night, I never came up with any significance for the eternal tears he left me. I never got the chance to ask him either. He left town the same night he had marked me.

Every time I come to the Iceberg, father's club, I dwell on the past. The colorful bartender tries to keep me out of my funks, and, on most nights, he does. Swishing his rainbow hair to every angle, his stripped shirts and starry pants break every rule my father ever had set for proper attire in his club. Skiz was able to break them though. Skiz had relations, blood, records. Bottom line, my only friend was my friend because he had information.

"Haley, baby," Skiz sung, dancing over to me in tune with the music. "You ever listen to The Beatles?" I glanced up at him, shaking my head slightly. He pout, leaning down on the bar in front of me. "There's a song that fits you perfectly ever night you come into the club. It's called _Dear Prudence._" He sung the last bit, humming a few bars as the music around us died down before starting up again with a fast beat song. I expect he would've started singing despite the music, but something behind me caught his attention as well as a stumbling couple that had sat down on the other side of the curved bar. I felt a rubber glove on my bare shoulder and knew exactly what had led Skiz to attend to the drunken pair as quickly as he did.

Father.

His hot breath on the back of my neck sent signals through my body, and not the kind I'm sure he'd want me to have being sent through me. The cold flipper on my shoulder slid down my arm and rested on my thigh. "What have I told you about wearing so much when I call upon you, my dear?" His rough voice would've given him away, even without the hint the flipper gave. I glanced down at my outfit. A tube top and skirt with fishnets covering my stomach and legs, leading down to tennis. Everything was black, even the sleeves that covered my arms.

"This is what you laid out for me." I growled, lot even trying to hide my distaste for his touch. A smirk played onto my lips when he let out a grunt of displeasure. Skiz eyed the two of us as he prepared drinks, sending a quick warning look at me before turning back to the customers.

"Why don't you come upstairs with daddy?" I felt his fin sliding to my inner thigh.

I turned my head to the side, my eyes wandering to the dance floor. "I was thinking of dancing a little tonight…" I smiled a little as his grip on my thigh tightened. The comment had upset him, meaning that he would be distracted. I decided to play with his mind a little, going full out on my little defiance act. Turning back to him, I smiled sweetly, placing a hand lightly on his thigh. "Surely you'd like your prey a little more…" I bit my lip, thinking of a word, then lent forward towards him and whispered "seasoned."

I could feel his breath on my skin and smell the fish rotting in the gums that held onto his sharp teeth. It sickened me. But to play along with father was the only way for me to stay alive. He gave a pleased smile and slid his flipper up my thigh, almost to where it met my torso. I stopped him a moment short, forcing myself to wink at him. "Now, now, papa, candy should be savored before lost." He nodded, his breath choppy.

"You…er, dance a little, then come visit me before you get…too attached to anyone down here." I smiled and nodded, helping him to relieve his flipper from my leg when he attempted once again to raise it higher. He waddled off to a set of curved stairs that led up to his office and living space.

I sighed and turned back around to the bar, folding my arms and dropping my head to them. I truly hated him. I heard a Skiz set a glass next to me and lift my head to see what it was. I didn't know the name of it, but I knew it 

was alcoholic. I looked up at the colorful boy. "Rainbow, you know I'm still seventeen. I may be old enough for consent in this town, but you could loose your job." I scold him, pushing the drink back to him.

Skiz pushed it right back. "You can only avoid him having his full way with you for so long, Haley." I didn't accept the drink, so he kept talking. "Look, it's not for your personal pleasure. You didn't ask for it. It's not for my benefit. This is to make it hurt less. Both physically and…hopefully mentally."

I sighed and took a sip. Despite my denial, Skiz was completely correct. There was no way that I'd be able to get through the man I call father doing the…_things_…I've avoided him doing since my birthday. Once I turned seventeen he officially lost every moral fiber that had restrained him through my life. But my mind was still messed over entirely, and Skiz knew that.

The taste of the alcohol was drowned by the taste of citrus. I smiled to myself. So Skiz _did_ remember what alcohol had done to me. I had learned every trick in the book from the drama club on how to cover my scars. No one would be able to notice them now, as long as I kept away from water. I continued to swallow the sweet substance until the glass was empty, setting it down and looking up at Skiz. "You think him off with walking out with another guy?"

Skiz shook his head, "Hay, he doesn't even have any meetings tonight to distract him. You _need_ to do this. We're out of things to do." I bit my bottom lip, clenching my eyes shut. I tried not to cry, but it was too much. I knew what was going to happen if I went up. But I couldn't help it. I let tears slide down my cheeks. I felt Skiz's hand on my back, heard his calming voice, but couldn't hear the words he was saying. I forced my face to relax and looked up at the closest thing I had ever had to family. A _real_ family. Not one that had ruined your life with sexual acts.

"Skiz….he's my _father…_" I whispered, wiping away the tears. Bits of my scars started to show through, I could tell.

"A father wouldn't do that to his child... he's no father," Skiz whispered. "I promise, I'll find a way to get you out of here." I smiled, pushing myself up from my seat and grabbing a simple black backpack from the floor. "That's my girl," Skiz smiled, pressing his hand to the back of my head and kissing my forehead before I walked to the bathroom, waiting for the alcohol to take full effect.

Once in the bathroom, I locked the door and hunched over the middle sink, staring at my reflection. I didn't have my glasses on and I looked like a gothic whore. My red bangs were straightened so they hung over my face, longer bangs framing my face. The color of my hair was a natural, beautiful red. They brought such beautiful images of the perfect mother to mind. What the woman that had given birth to me then dumped me with The Penguin had been like. He had probably raped her like he was about to do to me. No way would someone like what I imagined my mother to be keep the reminder of a terrible deed.

I sighed, grabbing a paper towel and running it under lukewarm water before rubbing it against each cheek. Long scars were revealed, traveling from directly under my eyelids to just above the corners of my lips. Bryce's handy work. I traced each with my fingers, what I remembered of that night flashing in the mirror before me. Shaking my head, I reached into my bag and pulled out a makeup kit, beginning the procedure of hiding the memories. Once that was done, I touched up my eyeliner and cleaned up the mess I left on the counter and left the bathroom, heading towards the stairs.

After the first turn, I saw a group of men enter the room. The air they had about them made my breath catch in my throat. They were dangerous. I ran up the remaining stairs, rushing into father's room and slamming the door behind me. I lent against it, sliding down as I tried to catch my breath. Something about them was familiar...but I couldn't place my finger on it.

"Ah, my little pet," I heard my father's voice coo in that fiendishly rough voice of his. My eyes popped open, my chest still moving with my gasps of breath.

"Something's wrong downstairs."

The Penguin laughed, his sharp teeth fully exposed. "Now, now, you won't give me any of your excuses tonight. You've escaped me plenty of times before with excuses, but now that you're of age…" His words got sharper 

and seemed to get angrier with each of his words. But his tone took a sudden softer tone, trying to win me over. "Now that you're of age to give consent, you don't need to be worried…you just need to accept me…"

I felt his flipper on my knee. I didn't have the energy to refuse him. Even if I did, he would've gotten to me some how. His flipper slid up my thigh to where it rested down at the bar as he knelt down next to me. Not like he had far to go down, anyway, the short, deformed man. I bit my bottom lip, clenching my eyes shut. I kept wishing that by closing my eyes I could block out his touch as well as the sight of it.

I felt the cold touch of the rubber against my inner thigh, above the fishnets, telling me exactly how high he had gotten. I felt his other flipper grope my chest and I prayed that something would happen. The smell of fish filled my nostrils before I could even inhale through them. My chest heaved worse now. He probably thought it was adrenaline, everything happening with me. Of course, lip biting and eye closing could be taken the wrong way if you wanted to take it like that…

As I was preparing myself for his flipper to move up to his favorite spot, I was soon met with a face full of wall. I could taste blood from when I bit down on my tongue, but no serious damage there. I turned my head weakly –the strong drink mixed with being slammed into a wall wasn't doing too nice to my brain – and saw father laying on his back, struggling like a roly-poly to roll over and get up.

A scene played through in my mind of a roly-poly crawling along a sidewalk. In the scene I bent down to touch it and it circled up into it's little ball form so I could pick it up and easily throw it what seemed miles away. Out of my life. I then imaged trying to do that to father. I'd break much more then my back. I would've bit down my tongue to keep from giggling, but the salty taste in my mouth told me I had done enough so I allowed my giggles to escape.

My giggles were soon drowned out by full force laughter. It was a tenor tone, but had a high pitched twinge of insanity. The laughter continued as a man entered the room. The door closed behind them as the laughter slowly died. From what I could see, the guy was wearing a purple suit and had faded green hair. "Hello, fishlips." The man's voice was nothing like his laughter. A gruff voice, deeper then the low notes in his laughter, yet it still had that twinge of insanity in it that made him unique.

"JOKER!" Father screeched, finally getting himself up off the floor. He adjusted his manacle before glaring at the man before him. "How did you find me?"

The man, Joker, laughed again, but his laugh was shorter this time, his laugh forming into words as he ignored the question. "My dear Penguin, you sold me out."

Father's jaw dropped. "That was _seventeen_ years ago!"

"Time doesn't make the crime any less severe, fishface. And the fact that Batman was there, without cops, is enough to tell me that someone told him where I would be." A glint in the man father referred to as Joker's hand revealed he held a knife. "I finally tracked you down after so many. I had to send one of my men out to get close to your daughter to make sure I had the right lead. It was a long wait for him to return with news. But it was well worth the wait." If possible, father's clammy complexion seemed to get paled as some reasoning I was missing was coming together in his mind. My mind, however, was finally as clouded as it would ever get. I could feel a slight change in my accent as I started to giggle again, telling me right off that I was full on drunk. The giggles brought The Joker's attention to me as he started to speak again. I kept on giggling, though every nerve in my body told me to stop. Every bit of sense within me twinged at the knowledge he had not known my existence until that moment, but my drunk giggles continued as it approached me. "There seems to be an audience for your death..."

I pushed myself against the wall, trying to blend into it. But it was futile. Gloved hands enclosed around my throat and dragged me up against the wall until even my feet hovered above the floor. As soon as I stared into his eyes, my giggles ceased and smile dropped. I was frozen in a murderer's grasp. His deep eyes revealed to me every sin he had committed in his life. Their gaze had shot right through the alcohol's effect and hit something deep. Something I felt worse then when father had touched me. Fear. When he spoke, it was as if he were speaking through me. Like I was some insignificant fly on the wall. "And who might you be, toots?"

"What's it to ya'?" I had formed a completely different accent. Something of a city girl. I never remembered enough of the accent to be able to look it up. But The Joker seemed to recognize it fairly well though. I realized then that I should've kept my mouth shut. The Joker's eyes widened, softening with his expression for a moment. Pain flickered in his eyes. But his body shook as if a chill had run through him and he was back to normal.

"Now, now, I asked you first." He teased, his knife tracing the hem of my top that had thankfully remained on my chest before the interruption. I watched as his smile grew again, his ruby lipstick smeared over white makeup. The rings around his eyes only made his soul look that much blacker. But the smile got me. Under the makeup he seemed to have scars. An eternal smile, much like my eternal tears. I blinked, trying to pry my eyes away from the scars to form a lie. Or at least words of some kind. He knew exactly where my eyes were directed. "You want to know where I got these scars?" I nodded weakly, hoping the story wouldn't end badly. He licked his lips, rolling his eyes back as if trying to remember the story. "I had a sister once..." The Joker ran his thumbs across my cheeks as he spoke, brushing up on my scars. The pale stage makeup on the gloves of his hands seemed to surprise him, halting his story. He let me drop to the floor, his eyes wide. He seemed to be caught off guard. I gasped for air, trying to reach for my bag.

The Joker didn't notice my attempts. He recovered like he had when I had spoken, but slower this time. His composure had a different feel as he pulled a gun from a pocket inside his purple coat and aimed it at my father. My eyes widened and the world seemed to stop completely. This man was going to kill the one I called father. Yes, father had tried to take advantage of me and had ruined my childhood from the inside out, but I would've never wished death upon him. I definitely would not have wished to watch him die. Time seemed to speed up as I finally reached my bag and stumbled to and out the door. I was halfway down the stairs when I heard a bang, a scream from father, and the laugh of The Joker.

I ran straight for the bar, not caring who was staring at me. "SKEZ!" I screamed, crashing into the bar and almost flying over it. "I need your help. I need to get out of Metropolis. And soon. That man...The Joker...he can't get me Skiz, he can't..." I was near crying as I heaved out words, out of breath from both being choked and running across the club.

Skiz froze in the middle of mixing a drink, watching me as everything seemed to click together in his mind. I was really getting tired of everyone else getting this puzzle except for me. Skiz hopped over the bar, announcing that the rest of the drinks were free that night for everyone that hadn't seen their faces. A cheer came from the crowd as Skiz pulled me to the back exit, the door revealing a beaten up truck. He left me at the passenger seat, running around to the other end. He hopped in the front seat and started to scream something at me, but it came as something softer thanks to the windows being rolled up. He lent over the seat and cranked down the window, telling me to get in.

"Where're we going, Skiz?" I asked as he buckled himself in and double checked to make sure my drunk ass was in. He told me that it was somewhere safe, out of Metropolis where no ties The Penguin had could lead to me. I questioned him again, and he mentioned the name of city I had heard before. Gotham.

For once that night, things seemed to snap together for me. Only, the pieces snapped the wrong way and my mentality snapped instead for that moment. I grabbed Skiz's arm as he pulled out of the alley. "My father's probably dying right now! Skiz! Someone has to save him! It's my fault he's dead! The Joker was after me!" Tears ran down my face, but the makeup was already ruined so I didn't care.

Skiz sighed. "Haley..." He paused, then shook his head, speeding up the car. "This really won't make sense to you right now. But it will when we get to our destination."

"Where are we going?" I asked for the second time, hoping to get an answer out of him this time. "And what won't make sense?"

Skiz looked over at me for a second before attaching his eyes to the road and not once looking at me again. He avoided my first question again, but thankfully answered the second. "Haley, Oswald Cobblepot is not your 

father..."

And so the world came crumbling down around me.

* * *

The car ride out of Metropolis would've been a quiet one if not for my ever lasting sobs. It had gotten worse through the hours as I continued to break down with each breath. My body shook worse with every sob. Every tear made my eyes hurt worse. Skiz had tried a few times to calm me down, but every attempt had failed him. I saw his hand reach out and shrunk away from him, pressing myself against the door. Instead of going for me, I saw his hand reach the radio and press the play button. Music fell out of the speakers, a low hum. It took Skiz singing to have me realize what he was singing.

"_Dear Prudence, won't you come out to play? Dear Prudence, greet the brand new day. The sun is up, the sky is blue, it's beautiful and so are you. Dear Prudence, won't you come out to play?_" The words brought my sobs to a halt, but the tears kept flowing down. They seemed to slow as Skiz's voice flowed through the car with the music. My eyelids suddenly seemed to gain a hundred pounds as they forced themselves closed. Against my personal wishes, my body curled up on the seat and drifted from a painful reality to what was hopefully a peaceful Wonderland.

I didn't exactly dream, instead running through the memories today. As if I hadn't already gone through it enough. But…something was different this time around. It was darker in the room, The Penguin's killer covered in shadows. Instead of the Joker's worn purple suit, a clean and freshly ironed suit was worn. I couldn't make out the color in the darkness. The figure was thinner and stood tall. He laughed at The Penguin's corpse. He whispered things to the corpse and I heard my name a few times.

I reached out to the man, trying to get him to come out of the shadows more so I could see who it was. The figure spun around and looked right down at me. I froze.

Something about them made me blush and grin like a small child. It was the exact opposite of the feeling the Joker had given me. The Joker's eyes were pure insanity and murder. These eyes… they had that same insanity, but they held so much more emotion. When The Joker had his eyes on me, I felt as if they had gone through me, but now, these softer eyes seemed to survey me.

A smile broke onto the stranger's lips as the light in the room began to fade. I felt his hand on mine, pulling me into it with him. "Haley…" His voice was soft, one hand on the small of my back, his other holding mine in the air in a dance pose. A last bit of light flashed over his eyes again, revealing a black mask over them. They wanted to confess something to me. But, when he went to speak, his lips close to my ear, the spoke no confession; only Skiz's soft voice was heard. "We're here."

The presence broke away from me like it was a blanket being torn off my sleeping body. I felt a hand on my shoulder, but I shrugged it off, clinging to the darkness. I wanted that man to come back. He wanted to tell me something…

I heard the click of a seatbelt, and then the presence of the seat disappeared beneath me. I heard Skiz saying something, but it wasn't directed towards me. Someone else was there. "Take her to a room in the back. It has no plants to disturb you two, the same way Harley liked having it." The new voice was female. I forced my eyes open, dreading that the dream wouldn't come back. I saw a flash of red hair, but I was too late to get a look at the woman. She was tall, and her long hair ran down her back. I watched it swish back and forth. I tried to remember if the man in my dreams had red hair. I rest my head on Skiz's shoulder as he carried me towards what looked in the darkness like a greenhouse. I closed my eyes, resting my eyes once again. I wondered how long we had been driving.

I felt leaves brushing against my legs as Skiz carried me, but didn't have the energy to look. I heard a door open and close and the feeling of leaves were gone. Skiz lift me from his arms and set me down on a feathery bed, pulling sheets up to my shoulders. "How long has she been sleeping?" I heard the female ask again.

"Since we got out of Metropolis, I think," Skiz replied, then sighed. "I told her about Cobblepot not being her father…" I tensed up, biting my bottom lip when he paused. "That's all I told her, honestly. I thought it would calm her down. But it only pushed her off the brink."

I heard light footsteps, most likely from the lady. "Skiz... I thought everyone agreed not to tell her. We were to leave her with Oswald and wait until the Joker was out of commission for good. What if she tried to find…"

"He's dead."

"What?"

"Oswald Cobblepot was killed. The Joker found him. Hell, he probably knows that was Haley back in Metropolis! I had no choice but to bring her here!" Skiz was trying to keep his voice down, but I could tell he was getting pissed at this woman. "Pam, you know I wouldn't let our work go to waste if I didn't absolutely need to." There was a pause, then both sighed. I gave up on the conversation, trying to fall back asleep before I gave away the fact I was asleep.

Maybe I could meet that shadowed man again. Find out who he is and why he has those eyes…

_My _eyes.


End file.
